Fair Is Fair

The FBI investigation into Clinton’s emails wasn’t rigged, it’s how the system is supposed to work.

Fair Is Fair
FBI Director James Comey makes a statement at FBI Headquarters in Washington, Tuesday, July 5, 2016. Comey said the FBI will not recommend criminal charges in its investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server while secretary of state.

FBI Director James Comey makes a statement at FBI Headquarters in Washington, Tuesday, July 5, 2016. (AP PHOTO/CLIFF OWEN)

I am a big fan of New Yorker columnist and comic Andy Borowitz. His piece Tuesday is priceless: “Congressional Republicans Vote to Abolish the FBI.”

He is referring, of course, to the decision announced by FBI Director James Comey, who said regarding the investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s emails that “no charges are appropriate in this case” and that “no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case.” Borowitz jokingly quotes Rep. Trey Gowdy talking about “the FBI’s ‘bloated and wasteful’ budget of eight billion dollars, which he (Gowdy) said could easily pay for an additional eleven hundred Benghazi investigations.”

The reactions from Republicans and Trump to Comey have been typically over-the-top: Trump tweeted it is a “rigged system” and “very, very unfair”; RNC spokesman Sean Spicer called it “a clear indictment” even though the FBI decision was precisely the opposite – no indictment.



This was a fair and independent investigation that lasted a year, not a congressional witch hunt of the sort that Republicans are prone to conduct. And it certainly wasn’t “unfair or rigged” as Trump attests.

But, of course, everything is rigged against the Donald – from all his bankruptcies, to his multiple business failures, to his legion of lawsuits. His decisions to not pay his bills to small businesses, his hiring of immigrants at below fair wages and his reaping millions when his casinos went under all have something very real to do with “fairness” and rigging the system.

Comey’s criticism of Clinton – he called her conduct “extremely careless” – is justified. It was a mistake, as she has said many times. But this was a fair and thorough American process designed to achieve justice. Sadly for Trump, he has never understood what true bullies never understand: Integrity and character and fairness should define leadership. Unlike Clinton, he has very little of it.